


Can't Get Used to Losing You

by TheCarmineWanker



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Angst, M/M, Mild Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-30 00:14:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16754176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCarmineWanker/pseuds/TheCarmineWanker
Summary: Ford's gone and Fiddleford is at a loss. Based on the song Can't Get Used to Losing You by The Beat.(It's a good song, I absolutely recommend you look it up.) AU.





	1. Prologue

After so much work and anticipation, the day was finally come. Today, they would activate the portal. To be perfectly honest, Fiddleford had many reservations and was quite nervous. His anxiety fucktupled when they stood there, tethered, before the open portal. For one mere second, his nerves seemed to melt away, replaced by his pride in their work. Then, everything went completely wrong.

Ford got caught up in it and was being pulled into the portal. Fiddleford braced himself against some machinery and fought to retrieve his friend. In spite of his efforts, the knot came undone and Ford was sucked into the portal, gone. Fiddleford checked the strength of the knot keeping the rope around his waist and, securing the other end, jumped in after the other man.

When he pulled himself back out of the Nightmare Realm, Fiddleford Hadron McGucket was a changed man. What he had seen was terrible, the worst part being that Ford was nowhere to be seen. His friend, partner, lover was gone, forever. Devastated, he curled up on the floor and cried.


	2. Empty Without You

Guess there's no use in hangin' 'round  
Guess I'll get dressed and do the town  
I'll find some crowded avenue  
Though it will be empty without you  
_______________________________________ 

It had been 3 months since the incident. Fiddleford had continued living in Ford’s house, staying in the same guest room. He had organized a memorial service, which Ford’s parents came to, and there was now an empty grave with Stanford Filbrick Pines written on it. When asked where the body was, he said it was lost in an experiment gone wrong. No one asked any more questions after that.

No one knew anything about or had much interest in anything of Ford’s. His parents had gone through his things but, in the end, left with only a class ring and a necktie. They had allowed Fiddleford to keep the house, having decided it was worthless. He guessed they saw it as not being worth the trouble of removing all the dangerous things themselves.

Fiddleford had completely destroyed the portal along with the cave writings that told Ford how to summon Bill. Normally, he was invested in preserving history. Now, however, he wanted to erase it completely. As such, he had also torn out and burned the pages from the journals containing the portal blueprints.

That was it, though. There was nothing more for him to do that he could do. He could not yet bring himself to be able to go through Ford’s things. It almost killed him to destroy the journal pages as it was. He thought it probably would kill him to hold one of his sweaters again knowing that that firm chest and strong arms would never fill it again.

The carnival was back in town, the same one he’d dragged Ford to before. Deciding he needed to do something differently, to get out of that house that reeked of despair and silence, he found himself going. In spite of the crowd and general excitement, he still felt horribly alone, cold despondency settled in his heart. Even as he was packed in like a sardine, it felt like he was the last person on earth. He wandered around aimlessly until he found himself at a palm reader’s tent. He went in and greeted the old woman.

“So you do palm readings, eh?”

“That’s what the sign says, isn’t it? Come here.” 

Obediently, he took a seat. She grabbed his hand and started looking at his palm with scrutiny. Her brow furrowed, then she let out a low “ooh” and clicked her tongue, as though in disapproval.

“Your marriage line is cut in half. I know a good lawyer if you need help with the divorce. Oh, but your love line’s nice and strong. Affair, huh? You didn’t strike me as the type.”

His mouth hung open. After a moment of dumb silence, Fiddleford raced out of the tent, back to the house. He had a wife and a child yet he had shacked up with his colleague and forgotten them both so easily. He had no idea how that had happened or how he was going to face them. That night, Fiddleford didn’t sleep. Instead, he stared at himself in the mirror, trying and failing to recognize himself, until the sunlight streamed in through the window.


	3. Some Girl I Used To Know

Called up some girl I used to know  
After I heard her say "Hello"  
Couldn't think of anything to say  
Since you're gone it happens every day  
_____________________________________ 

For the first time in a while, Fiddleford picked up the phone and dialed a number that once had been familiar but now felt entirely foreign. His anxiety grew with each ring. Finally, after the fourth ring, just when he thought he couldn’t take it anymore, someone answered.

“Hello?” 

He froze. All coherent thought left his head at her voice. It was his wife, someone he should be comfortable with, but now hearing her voice just made him feel sick. He hung up without saying a word. And how could he have said anything when all the words had fled from his brain as soon as he heard her speak? He was loath to admit it, but she was hardly his wife anymore. 

She was more like a stranger, someone he felt uncomfortable sharing personal information with; just some girl he used to know. That’s why he’d felt sick: because calling her had felt like calling a stranger with the intention of talking to them like a spouse. Perhaps he should go back to the palm reader and ask about that lawyer. He chuckled at the thought.

Even if his wife was now a stranger to him, however, he still cared about his son. Selfish though it may be, Fiddleford still really wanted to be in Tate’s life. He hadn’t the foggiest as to how he could do that, though. He didn’t think he could face his wife, never mind take her to court and claim her son. With him gone, Tate was pretty much all she had left. He just couldn’t, on good conscience, take him away from her when he’d basically thrown them both away. 

Sometimes he thought about what it would’ve been like it Ford were still around and if he was free of Bill. He didn’t like thinking about that because he knew he would’ve left his family to be with him. There was no telling how or when Stanford Filbrick Pines became the most important aspect of Fiddleford’s life, but one thing was certain; now that Ford was gone, he felt empty. He knew there was no way he could go back and fix his marriage. It would be impossible for him to restore his feelings for his wife and continue where they left off, their relationship then founded on lies. No, he was alone. He couldn’t go back either way, to fix things or to properly end them, so he was stuck there in limbo, an absent father who never came home.

For the first time since Ford disappeared, Fiddleford went into his room. He pulled out a sweater from one of the drawers and, after the initial pang of sadness, put it on, relishing in how the warm, ill-fitting garment draped over his thin frame. He lied down on the bed, clutching a blanket. Memories of intimacy they had shared in that bed flitted through his mind- every touch, every kiss, every whisper. Tears flowed freely down his face until he drifted off to sleep, a dead man’s name lingering on his lips.


	4. A Hopeless Case

I'll find somebody, wait and see  
Who am I kiddin', only me  
'Cause no one else could take your place  
Guess that I am just a hopeless case  
_______________________________________ 

Three and a half weeks later, Fiddleford decided it was time to move on with his life. He thought that maybe, what he needed to do was just find someone new. He went into town and soon enough was chatting with a lovely woman named Beatrice, whom he’d already met a couple times. He’d ran into her in front of the post office and now they were talking about bluebirds, which she was rather fond of. 

She seemed to like him just fine, casually touching his arm and laughing at the stuff he said. On the other hand, Fiddleford just felt like there was a ball of lead in his belly. It felt completely wrong to be there talking to her. As they continued talking, it just got worse. When she asked him if he’d like to grab some coffee at Greasy’s, he politely declined, saying he had stuff to do, and went back to the house.

Who was he kidding, thinking he could just find someone new, when he knew damn well the only one for him was Ford? That conversation had just proved how much he was still in love with that man, dead or not. Irritated, he flopped on Ford’s bed and wanked to the memories he had of fucking him. He remembered thrusting into that delightfully tight ass and what that hot, wet mouth had felt like around his dick. Images and memories of sounds flooded his head, bringing him to climax.

Irritation gone, he felt despair instead. It was now clear that no one could ever take Ford’s place and that really, Fiddleford was just hopeless. He was stuck in a limbo of sorts, unable to go back to his wife but also unable to move forward with someone new. He was trapped in the middle, desperately in love with a dead man. Part of him was tempted to recreate the portal, to fling himself into that living nightmare and suffer the same fate, whatever that may be. His life already was a nightmare, so he didn’t think the Nightmare Realm would even scare him anymore. While he had destroyed it and the blueprints, he had worked on it and could probably recall it, perhaps through hypnosis.

Shaking his head, he dismissed the thought and went to take a shower to clean off. As the cold water washed over him, he thought. He thought about what happened to Ford, if he could still be alive, if he was taken prisoner and tortured, all the ways he could have died, where his body could be, if it hadn’t been destroyed completely. A particularly annoying part of him still hoped he was alive out there somewhere, that he managed to pop off somewhere else and that’s why he wasn’t there when Fiddleford went looking for him. No matter how much he told himself that no, Ford is gone and will never come back, that part of him would not be silenced. He hated it.


	5. My Whole Life Through

Can't get used to losing you  
No matter what I try to do  
Gonna live my whole life through  
Loving you  
________________________________ 

Ten years later, Fiddleford was still living in that house, still just as miserable. Try as he might, he just couldn’t get used to losing Ford and all his efforts were in vain. Not only was there no one else in the whole world who could take his place, but he couldn’t even just stop mourning and exist as an empty shell. That’s all he wanted, to be empty and unfeeling. Instead, it seemed that he was cursed to live the entire rest of his life loving this man who was gone forever.

In his time there, he had tinkered with robotics and computers and even made some decent money, but none of that made him happy anymore. Technology that he used to love he now hated because no matter what it was, even a fucking toaster, he always saw that damn portal and how technology had ruined his life. Unfortunately, it really was all he knew, and he had to make a living somehow. So, he locked himself in the lowest level, where that awful portal had been, and developed fancy stuff to sell to companies. 

That’s how it was until one day, there was a knock on the door. Curious, because he never had visitors, Fiddleford opened the door and almost dropped dead with shock. Standing there, grinning like an idiot, was Stanford Filbrick Pines. After a solid minute of gaping, Fiddleford finally found the ability to speak.

“You’re alive?”

“Well, I’m certainly not a ghost. Mind if I come in?” 

Stepping aside, Fiddleford let him inside. A minute later, they were sitting at the kitchen table with a kettle on for tea.

“How are you here?”

“Well, with some help I defeated Bill and then found my way back here. The Axolotl was really helpful.” Fiddleford couldn’t help it, he started to tear up.

“I thought you were dead. There’s an empty grave with your name on it.” Ford’s face crumbled in pity.

“I’m sorry. I wish there had been some way to contact you. Although I am curious, why are you here? Where’s your family?” Fiddleford shook his head.

“Gone. She was a stranger, I couldn’t go back to her and I couldn’t even face her, never mind take her to court properly. I tried to call her once, but I couldn’t even say anything. I regret not being there for Tate, but I just couldn’t do it. So I just never went back, never said a damn word, either.” Ford was shocked.

“Fidds, I’m so sorry.”

“Well it doesn’t matter now.” Fiddleford shook his head. “It’s been ten years now. And you’re back, which is really all that matters.”

“Yes, I must say, seeing you again is easily the best part of coming back. I really missed you, you know.” He furrowed his brow. “Fidds, I just want to say that I am so sorry about the portal and everything. I never should have trusted Bill.”

“No shit.” For the first time in a long time, Fiddleford smiled. “Apology accepted, just never do it again, you hear me?”

“Loud and clear.” Ford’s grin matched his. 

A second later, they were on top of each other, recreating some of Fiddleford’s fondest memories. He’d never been happier than that moment, when the love of his life had returned and he knew they’d never be parted again. It was clear that he would, indeed, continue to love Ford for the rest of his life, but that, rather than a curse, it would be a blessing instead since that man had come back from the dead.


End file.
